What is objectively good art?

[PureX]

But it has a clear objective value unlike art.

Yes, which is why works of art and furniture are very different things. Art has a metaphysical function and purpose. Furniture only has a physical function and purpose.

 

[Clara Tea]

What is objectively good art? Convince me that art can be objectively good.

Can art be objectively bad or good? - Quora

K-Grace Lily (Quora): Based on standards of experts, art can be objectively good.

Arthur Finny (Quora): Standards differ by opinion (subjective).

How, then, could we judge art at a fair? Unfairly?

When you go to the Berkeley Art Museum you will see totally white canvases. Good?

Andy Warhol nailed a rope knot to a wall. That became art.

Toilets are art.

That’s Just, Like, Your Opinion, Man: An Argument that Art is Objective

The Blaue Reiter were formed to oppose the Neue Kunsttlervereinigung Munchen in 1911, and consisted of artists of the Avante Guarde movement who lent moral support to each other. The acceptance of their art by others was likely a result of snobbery (something like the Emperor's new clothes). Picasso, Gauguin, Van Gogh, et al, were members of the Blaue Reiter. Others members, like Henry Rousseau were primatives who didn't even understand the basic precepts of art (such as perception, and lacking perception their art was 2 dimensional, not 3--like the Lion in the Desert). The dada art movement opposed the industrial movement (many, at the time, not in the Avante Guarde movement, were taken by technology, so they drew buildings, factories, and trains). The dada movement was formed during WW I in Zurich, reacting to the horrors and folly of war. Picasso, too, painted horrors of war, including a horse with a severe wound. Does the horse symbolize something? Picasso said, at one point, it did, then said that sometimes a horse is just a horse. Andy Warhol said that sometimes art is just for art's sake (not intended to mean anything, and not intended to please anyone).

The Avante Guarde movement also swept through the art form of music with such things as Musique Concrete, and random song generators.

The art and music professors who taught my course on Avante Guarde art knew that art majors didn't work hard (art was a snap major), so they punished non-art majors by loading a 3 foot stack of papers the night before the midterms, making sure that the papers were checked out by their students before the exams (leaving no test materials for anyone else to study), testing the students on coursework from other courses (different art courses), and not testing students on course work from the course they taught. Having a fine music and art education prior to their course, at home, I made an A in their course anyway. For example, I knew that the pentatonic scale was used in both Irish and Japanese music (and they asked about that in the course). They tried to flunk non-art majors, who study hard, but failed to do so in my case.

 

[Rawshak]

We don’t need to determine it in a general sense. It already has been determined. Art is one human’s endeavoring to share his / her experience of being with other humans, by capturing and displaying it in some objective medium.

But how does that help us towards whether art is objectively good, the artist would have to explain his experience for us to know if he had achieved his purpose.

 

[ChristineM]

What is objectively good art?

Convince me that art can be objectively good.

Art is in the eye of the beholder, therefore subjective.

 

[PureX]

I agree that you and I may have different ideas of art based on our past interactions. Honestly, you strike me more as the type who would value the kind of stuff you see in a museum, and that's okay. I respect that, if so. I consider myself more of the type to do digital art, paints, maybe even try something like colored pencils.

I disagree however, that few know what art is, though I do think some people aren't born with a natural inclination to being artists. And there's not much in the immediate, rather than long term, way of helping them get better at it.

On the other hand, I agree that 'good art' can be rare and special, even though I think you and I may have different ideas on 'art'.

I am not a snob about the medium or the context. But I am a snob about the purity of the endeavor. I do not accept crafts, or decoration, or entertainment, or titillation, or nostalgia, or shocking afrontery, etc., as art. A work of art may employ any of these mechanisms, or it may not. But to be a work of art, it must be serving the art endeavor, and not these lesser goals.

 

[Rawshak]

Yes, which is why works of art and furniture are very different things. Art has a metaphysical function and purpose. Furniture only has a physical function and purpose.

I think that furniture can be a work of art, but you are not helping to conclude art can be objectively good.

 

[PureX]

But how does that help us towards whether art is objectively good, the artist would have to explain his experience for us to know if he had achieved his purpose.

The artist captures his experience of being in the artwork: In the manipulation of the objective medium. Every decision he makes gets recorded, physically, by the medium. And we can ‘read’ those decisions through that medium. In that way, we ‘read’ the mind and heart that made those decisions.

 

[PoetPhilosopher]

I am not a snob about the medium or the context. But I am a snob about the purity of the endeavor. I do not accept crafts, or decoration, or entertainment, or titillation, or nostalgia, or shocking afrontery, etc., as art. A work of art may employ any of these mechanisms, or it may not. But to be a work of art, it must be serving the art endeavor, and not these lesser goals.

I accept that and acknowledge you to be the more experienced artist than me, despite differing/breaking on this subject as to what I believe. I wish you good wishes, however, and the hope we both see a lot of art we enjoy.

 

[PureX]

I think that furniture can be a work of art, but you are not helping to conclude art can be objectively good.

When the chair becomes a work of art, it is no longer a chair. It’s art. You can still sit on it, but that is no longer the reason that it exists. That is no longer what defines it, or it’s value.

 

[Rawshak]

The artist captures his experience of being in the artwork: In the manipulation of the objective medium. Every decision he makes gets recorded, physically, by the medium. And we ‘read’ those decisions through that medium. In that way, we ‘read’ the mind and heart that made those decisions.

Beksinski never named his art and objected strongly to people who tried to explain his paintings.

 

[PureX]

I accept that and acknowledge you to be the more experienced artist than me, despite differing/breaking on this subject as to what I believe. I wish you good wishes, however, and the hope we both see a lot of art we enjoy.

I am puzzled by what you find disagreeable in my idea of art as a specific human endeavor. Aren’t philosophy, religion, science, medicine, law, and so on defined by their respective endeavors? So why would art be any different?

 

[PureX]

Beksinski never named his art and objected strongly to people who tried to explain his paintings.

If they were any good, why would he need to? They would speak for themselves. But keep in mind that artists are as susceptible to their own stupidity as anyone else. I have heard many really good artists say some really stupid things about art.

 

[Spirit of Light]

What is objectively good art?

Convince me that art can be objectively good.

Because each person is different, there would not be an objectively good or bad. There is not only one answer to art being good or bad. it depend on each person and their preferences

 

[RestlessSoul]

If we are talking about visual art, then before the invent of the camera, representation was one objective criterion that could be used to judge a work of art. The ability to paint a horse that looked like a horse, or a human hand that looked like a hand, was enough to show that the artist was capable of achieving what he or she set out to do.

The camera changed everything though; the decision to paint or draw, rather than photograph, a face, a moving form, a still life or a reflection on the surface of the pond, is a decision to do something more than just reproduce an image. So before we can begin to judge a piece of art, we have to have some idea of what the artist is trying to show us, beyond simple representation. In a sense that was always true, but with the likes of Titian or Vermeer or Hokusai, we know straight away that we are in the presence of greatness simply because the images they produced were so visceral you could step into the painting.

So how do you judge a Jackson Pollock or a Mark Rothko? Objectivity, it’s arguable that you can’t, really. Speaking for myself, I have never failed to be moved by the series of paintings Rothko created on commission for the Four Seasons restaurant in New York, which he donated at the last minute to the Tate Britain (thanks, Mark). But it’s a futile job , for me anyway, trying to defend them from the accusation that they are ”just massive daubs of paint”. Because that’s really what they are.

My partner hates the band Oasis. She says it’s just a noise; to which I always reply, “Yeah, but what a bloody noise”.

 

[robocop (actually)]

What is objectively good art?

Convince me that art can be objectively good.

Art that is vivid.

 

[robocop (actually)]

Art that is vivid or having many details.

 

[PoetPhilosopher]

I am puzzled by what you find disagreeable in my idea of art as a specific human endeavor. Aren’t philosophy, religion, science, medicine, law, and so on defined by their respective endeavors? So why would art be any different?

Well I started this two-way conversation with you, so I might as well explain....

I was going by that you kind of have different ideas of art than me. In 2020, you talked about how a few things I posted weren't art, then you created a thread later posting what you considered art. I didn't see what you considered art as my cup of tea.

Upon reading some more of your posts, I see my understanding of art as more basic than yours, adding less premises as to what's art.

That's what I was saying.

 

[PureX]

If we are talking about visual art, then before the invent of the camera, representation was one objective criterion that could be used to judge a work of art. The ability to paint a horse that looked like a horse, or a human hand that looked like a hand, was enough to show that the artist was capable of achieving what he or she set out to do.

The camera changed everything though; the decision to paint or draw, rather than photograph, a face, a moving form, a still life or a reflection on the surface of the pond, is a decision to do something more than just reproduce an image. So before we can begin to judge a piece of art, we have to have some idea of what the artist is trying to show us, beyond simple representation. In a sense that was always true, but with the likes of Titian or Vermeer or Hokusai, we know straight away that we are in the presence of greatness simply because the images they produced were so visceral you could step into the painting.

So how do you judge a Jackson Pollock or a Mark Rothko? Objectivity, it’s arguable that you can’t, really. Speaking for myself, I have never failed to be moved by the series of paintings Rothko created on commission for the Four Seasons restaurant in New York, which he donated at the last minute to the Tate Britain (thanks, Mark). But it’s a futile job , for me anyway, trying to defend them from the accusation that they are ”just massive daubs of paint”. Because that’s really what they are.

My partner hates the band Oasis. She says it’s just a noise; to which I always reply, “Yeah, but what a bloody noise”.

I think what the invention of the camera really showed us was that representational painting and drawing were never only representational. They were a view of the subject through the artist’s eyes, heart, and mind. In fact, that’s what made the great art of those days, great art. Not the accuracy of the visual representation, but the gift of being able to see the world through the eyes, heart, and mind of the artist.

It’s why photographs are not automatically considered works of art. They only become works of art when an artist uses that medium to share his view of the world, his heart and mind in that moment, with us.

 

[Brickjectivity]

Art can be anything you want it to be etc

That precludes your conclusion. By saying it can be anything I want you have precluded your conclusion.

just convince me that it can be objectively good.

You already said there is no definition. That is equivalent to saying there is no definition which includes goodness, so there is only a word game. Your challenge is actually "Assuming art has no definition, what is good art?"

 

[DNB]

What is objectively good art?

Convince me that art can be objectively good.

I agree with @sun rise that the question is somewhat ambiguous. As to good in the moral sense, I agree with sr's comment that it can be called good if it elicits a regard for the righteous or morally correct.
But from a secular standpoint, I believe that success in art is when an artist is consistently able to achieve a particular reaction from his audience, and know who that audience is.
Whether the emotion that is evoked is one of peace or admiration, disdain or contempt, serenity or pensiveness, anger or rage, if these were the intent of the artist, then the artist has successfully discovered the art of producing specific emotions within his selected audience, ...irrespective of the medium employed in the art form.

I say 'selected audience' because an artist should also be fully aware of the subjectivity in perception of each individual person. Therefore, only a fool would say that one can please all the people, all the time. But, it is enough, as far as qualifying art goes, to say that either 10% of those who see my work will get the message, or 50%, 75% or more. This projection also requires insight, and thus further underscores the acumen of the artist.